Life á la Castle
by KateCavallo
Summary: Kate and Rick are married and have two children, with one more on the way...
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: The characters belong to Andrew Marlowe, I just borrow them.**

It was a beautiful morning. Kate was sitting on a bench, watching the playground. She smiled as she saw Rae approaching the swing set. It had been her favorite too, when she had been a little girl.

Rae was very much like her. She looked like a mini-Castle for sure, with those fascinating blue eyes, but on the inside, she truly was a Beckett. She didn't like too much attention, kept more to herself. But like Kate, she felt deeply. She loved whole-heartedly, enjoyed life purely.

Right now, she was laughing as she got higher and higher on the swings, until she could almost reach the sky, or so it looked.

It was almost 9 o'clock by now, Kate couldn't believe they had already spent an hour in the park. They should get going soon, Ava and Rick would want their breakfast.

About ten minutes later, Kate walked towards Rae.

"Honey, I know you're having fun, but how about we go home and make breakfast for Daddy and LJ?"

"Oh yeah, Mommy can we make pancakes? Please, I wanna eat pancakes!"

"Yeah, why not." Kate smiled.

Rae quickly grabbed Kate's hand and together they started their way home. After a 15 minutes' walk they arrived at the loft.

"Okay sweetheart, you wanna help me with breakfast or go and wake Daddy and LJ?"

After a moment of hesitating Rae responded, "I wanna help you" and quickly disappeared into the kitchen.

When they had finished making breakfast and Rick and her oldest still hadn't shown up, Kate went up the stairs to look after them. First she approached her and Rick's bedroom, only to find him half asleep in the middle of the bed.

"Enjoying having the whole bed to yourself, huh?" she whispered as she approached him.

"Mhm" Rick slowly opened first one eye, then the other.

"Hey beautiful" he murmured and she leaned down to kiss him.

"Breakfast's ready." Kate stated as Rick suddenly became very much awake.

"Did you just say breakfast? And what is that smell? Did you make pancakes?"

Kate just smiled. "Rae is waiting downstairs, I'll just go and wake Leah."

Rick quickly got up and went down the stairs eagerly. After all there were pancakes waiting for him!

Slowly, Kate opened the door to Leah's room. She knew how much her daughter loved to sleep in on Saturdays, but as she went in she found Leah sitting in the rocking chair in the corner, holding a book. As she went nearer, she recognized the book as the album with all the photographs of Leah as a baby that Kate had made.

Leah heard her mom coming up to her and let the album sink down. "Morning Mom" she said with a smile.

"Morning sunshine" Kate responded, also smiling. "What are you looking at?"

Instead of answering, Leah showed her. It was the picture of Kate and her that she adored so much, the one where Kate was sitting in the very same rocking chair holding Leah in her arms. But what made that picture so special was the way Kate looked at Leah, so full of love and hope.

"You were only a few weeks old back then. I hadn't even noticed your Dad standing in the door until I heard the 'click' of the camera" Kate remembered laughing.

"Come on, let's go and have breakfast" she said and led Leah towards the door, grabbing the album to take it with her.

Downstairs Rick and Rae were waiting for them. "Come on" Rick groaned, "we're starving!" he said dramatically.

They all laughed before they sat down around the table and had breakfast together.


	2. Chapter 2

After breakfast, Leah and Rae went into Rae's room to play while Rick and Kate made themselves comfortable on the couch for a lazy Saturday. Rick sat down in one corner and Kate leaned against him.

"You know we should probably talk about Leah's birthday. It's only a few weeks until then and we still haven't planned anything" Kate began.

"Maybe we should just throw a big party at the loft and invite all her friends. They could play all sorts of games and maybe watch some movies."

"_All_ her friends? Have you met your daughter? She was friends with everybody as soon as she walked into school. I think we should narrow it down to ten or fifteen."

"Right. I always forget she's actually so much like me, I mean she just looks like a smaller version of you."

Suddenly Kate remembered the album and began looking through it for the photograph. "Leah was looking at that photo when I wanted to wake her."

Although it was almost eight years ago now, Rick still remembered that moment.

"It was just perfect, how you two sat there. I'm really glad I took that photo, even though I kinda destroyed the moment."

"Yeah, Leah immediately started crying and wouldn't stop for half an hour" Kate laughed.

"Hey, I think little one is awake. He just kicked me. You wanna feel?" Kate asked as Rick looked down onto her stomach and laid his hand on it.

"Wow, he's strong!" he said, surprised and amazed at the same time.

"Yeah he is. I don't think I can hide the pregnancy from Victoria any longer. It was hard enough hiding it from the boys and Lanie the first few months. She'll put me on desk duty like the last two times, I don't think I'll make it through that without some serious damage." Kate stated with a sigh.

"You know I could come with you. We could get Alexis to look after the girls in the morning, and we could pick them up from school and kindergarten after work."

"You know, that actually is a great idea. I really miss you at the precinct, although it's been years now it's still like something is missing."

"It's settled then. From next week on I will return to the precinct! Thank god Victoria doesn't hate me anymore."

"Yeah, that would've been a problem." Kate laughed, "Actually she was quite understanding when we first got together. I think she always knew about us, remember how she didn't seem surprised when we made it official? And the moment her last doubts about you vanished would definitely be the one she saw Leah for the first time. She just adored her so much, I couldn't even believe it at first."

"Rae had the same effect on her. She actually didn't say a word for at least an hour 'cause she was so sunken into her eyes. Let's see what effect number three will have on her!"


End file.
